Girls outperform boys on tests but receive lower secondary school advice, study finds

Girls in the Netherlands are receiving lower secondary school recommendations than boys despite outperforming them on final and transition tests, a new study by the Dutch Education Executive Agency (DUO) shows.

The research, commissioned by the Ministry of Education, Culture and Science (OCW), analyzed differences between school advice for boys and girls and compared current data with figures from six years ago. It found that since 2018, girls in group 8 of primary school have received havo or vwo recommendations less frequently than boys, even though their test results are slightly better.

"The probability that a boy with the same performance and characteristics receives a higher recommendation than a girl is nearly 5 percentage points greater,” DUO reported.

The disparity changes during secondary school. While girls initially receive more vmbo-level recommendations, by the third year, they are more likely than boys to be studying at havo or vwo level. DUO noted that boys more frequently attend vmbo classes than their initial advice would suggest.

Primary school students receive a preliminary school recommendation in group 8, followed by a transition test that may adjust the advice. Until the 2022-2023 school year, schools were required to raise a recommendation if the test results were higher than the initial advice. Since 2023-2024, this adjustment is no longer mandatory.

The transition test was originally introduced to improve equality of opportunity, but education sector organizations have warned that it has had the opposite effect. “Since the transition test, the differences have grown,” the sector association for primary education reported this year.

Martijn Meeter, a professor of educational sciences at the Vrije Universiteit, called the findings “surprising.” “Girls were more affected by COVID than boys, but before the pandemic, they received higher recommendations than boys, which was justified: girls perform better at school. I had hoped that the difference would narrow after COVID, but that is not the case,” Meeter told RTL.